proportion of whom, bankrupt in fortune
and reputation, have involved many of the North in their
disgrace and ruin--hold in mental bondage the whole population
of this great republic, who permit themselves to be involved in
the common disgrace of presenting a spectacle of national
inconsistency altogether without a parallel. I confess that,
although an admirer of many of the institutions of your country,
and deeply lamenting the evils of my own government, I find it
difficult to reply to those who are opposed to any extension of
the political rights of Englishmen, when they point to America
and say, that where all have a control over the legislation but
those who are guilty of a dark skin, slavery and the slave-trade
remain not only unmitigated, but continue to extend; and that
while there is an onward movement in favor of its extinction,
not only in England and France, but even in Cuba and Brazil,
American legislators cling to this enormous evil, without
attempting to relax or mitigate its horrors. Allow me,
therefore, to appeal to you by every motive which attaches you
to your country, seriously to consider how far you are
accountable for this state of things, by want of a faithful
discharge of those duties for which every member of a republican
government is so deeply responsible; and may I not express the
hope that, on all future occasions, you will take care to
promote the election of none as your representatives who will
not _practically_ act upon the principle that in every clime,
and of every color, 'all men are equal?'

"Your sincere friend,

"JOSEPH STURGE.

"_Philadelphia, 6th Month 7th_, 1842."

This letter was extensively reprinted, not only in the anti-slavery but
in pro-slavery newspapers, both in the North and South. In the numerous
angry comments upon it, no attempt that has come to my knowledge was
made to deny any one of my statements. One of the papers intimates that
the vote by which the house soon after refused to adopt a specific and
exclusive rule against abolition petitions, was brought about by "the
sinister influence of Mr. Sturge." I need not add how happy I should
have been to have possessed the influence with which this writer has so
liberally invested me, and that I should have regarded it as a talent to
be employed and improved to the very utmost.

I spent from the 5th